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Tuesday, August 14, 2012

A Bright and Shining Lie. The Canonization of Saint Eliot Ness. B. Todd Jones thinks rebranding the ATF will solve its problems and make us all forget about Ruby Ridge, Waco and the Gunwalker Scandal.

Ness remarried in 1939, to illustrator Evaline Michelow. The Nesses moved to Washington, D.C. in 1942 where he worked for the federal government, directing the battle against prostitution in communities surrounding military bases, where venereal disease was a serious problem. Later he made a number of forays into the corporate world, all of which failed from his lack of business acumen. In 1944, he left to become chairman of the Diebold Corporation, a security safe company based in Ohio. After his second divorce and third marriage, he ran unsuccessfully for mayor of Cleveland in 1947, after which he was expelled from Diebold. In the aftermath, Ness began drinking more heavily and spending his free time in bars telling (often exaggerated) stories of his law enforcement career. He also spent himself into debt. Ness was forced into taking various odd jobs to earn a living, including as an electronics parts wholesaler, a clerk in a bookstore, and selling frozen hamburger patties to restaurants. By 1953, he came to work for an upstart company called Guaranty Paper Corporation, which specialized in watermarking legal and official documents to prevent counterfeiting. Ness was offered a job because of his expertise in law enforcement. The company soon moved from Cleveland to the quiet rural town of Coudersport, Pennsylvania, where operating costs were lower. He made a decent income from GPC and moved with his wife and adopted son into a modest rental house. Once again, he enjoyed going to local bars and regaling amazed audiences with his tales of crime fighting. He collapsed and died at his home of a massive heart attack on May 16, 1957, at the age of 54. Collaborating with Oscar Fraley in his last years, he co-wrote the book The Untouchables, which was published a month after his death.[11] This book, among others about the Untouchables by Oscar Fraley, was heavily spiced with fiction including fictional characters and events to make the books more appealing to a general audience. -- Wikipedia.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives brings fewer than a hundred alcohol and tobacco cases a year. It now plays second fiddle to the Federal Bureau of Investigation on explosives. And its skill at catching firearms violators is in doubt after the flawed probe known as Fast and Furious.

No wonder the agency's boss is looking to reinvent it, and maybe even change its name.

The ATF is a Washington oddity, stitched together in the 1970s from units going back to the age of Prohibition. Gun-rights supporters are wary of it, yet they are also loath to see firearms regulation move to the FBI.

So the ATF survives, and acting director B. Todd Jones has to figure out what to do with it. "We're the entity that everyone loves to hate," said the 55-year-old former Marine.

Mr. Jones, who doubles as the U.S. attorney in Minneapolis, said he sees a "sweet spot" for the agency in tackling violent crime, particularly in some big cities like Philadelphia that have seen an increase in murders and drug-related shootings.

Hence an idea discussed by top ATF officials: ditching the agency's anachronistic seven-word name and rebranding it the Violent Crime Bureau. Mr. Jones confirms the discussions, but cautions it isn't easy because the change would require congressional approval. The bigger point, he says, is to improve the morale and professionalism of agents who often grumble about being overshadowed by the FBI.

Since taking over last year as the ATF's fifth acting director in six years, Mr. Jones has tightened controls over undercover probes and confidential informants. New chiefs are in place in 16 field offices. And he consulted a historian to dig up proud moments in the agency's past. Legendary lawman Eliot Ness worked for an ATF predecessor known as the Bureau of Prohibition, leading his team of "untouchables" against the distilleries that made Al Capone rich.

"Legendary lawman" indeed. As the Wikipedia citation quoted above indicates, much of the "legend" came from the failed old drunkard's own mouth. Yet it is certain that Ness is now, and always has been, the patron saint of the gun cops of the ATF. His birthday, 19 April, is celebrated with ATF award dinners and golf tournaments, and the story circulated after the fiery end of the Davidians at the hands of the FBI that the Fibbies had chosen Ness' birthday to repay the Mount Carmel residents with interest (about twenty to one) for the four dead ATF agents killed in the 28 February raid that began the standoff. (While Mt. Carmel was still burning, the FBI raised a flag with four stars and "ATF" emblazoned on it. A pretty birthday picture it was for the Eliot Ness fans of the ATF.)

But, hey, B. Todd, go ahead and try to rebuild your agency around a bright and shining lie that owes more of its currency to Hollywood than to history, and by all means, rename it the "Violent Crime Bureau." The Davidians wouldn't quarrel with that name, nor would the thousands of Mexican victims of the Gunwalker Scandal. Violent crime, from the crippling of Kenyon Ballew up through the murder of Brian Terry, is what the ATF has facilitated or committed itself. Good choice, B. Todd.

A present from the FBI to the ATF on the birthday of Eliot Ness, 19 April 1993.

21 comments:

Ike
said...

Just like the attempt to name the ATF building in Washington after Eliot Ness, ATF would now like to identify themselves as "The Untouchables". That must not the case. The American People must hold ATF accountable for their deeds.

Hell, I won't forget what they've done and tried to do to Len, nor them running a 22 year never had a trace small dealer friend near me out of business for paperwork violations SINCE they've become DOJ and there were no violations but the FFL was in his late 70s and they made it abundantly clear that it wasn't worth him bothering to fight, as they'd out-lawyer him. DOJ or Treasury, it's still the same idiots and scumbags and they are still playing good cop-bad cop with the lards of Fairfax.

I'm going to dislike them as an agency as long as they are dis-likable.

@tom, ,,I'm going to hate them so long as I breathe. Murder has no statute of limitations with me. Give them a new name? For shit sake, you cannot smokescreen past murderous behavior with cosmetics. If B. Tod Jones, a former Marine, retained any honor at all, he would have appointed a team to go after any and all wrong-doers within the agency. Even if he gutted the whole group, just as they deserve, so what? Americans would be safer. Screw B. Tod Jones!

I think the appropriate word is hate, not dislike, and it now extends far beyond simply this agency.

They know this and don't care that we know that they know we know. This is a VERY clear indicator of their intentions. An unmistakable indicator.

The American people have been declared potential enemies of the American people, potential enemies of the security and power of the state, which is supposed to reside with the people.

They are the state and they want to rule over all things, in spite of the people and completely against the constitution and bill of rights, modified to their desires by the judges that they appoint and who now full serve their interests and not the people's.

You only need that which they wish you to have and they can now take anything they want from you, including your life, without consequences. The media will cover for them, will construct and produce their defences and will gatekeep all things negative and all truthful information.

Some people still think that this is simply an accident, that will soon be corrected, by someone......else....

In 1985, the group [MOVE] made national news when police dropped a bomb on the Osage house from a helicopter in an attempt to end an armed standoff. The explosion ignited a fire in which 11 people died, including five children and the group's leader, John Africa. Only two occupants survived, Ramona, an adult and Birdie, a child. In addition, 60 homes were destroyed as the entire block burned.

A while back when one of the Rockefeller clan remarked that " maybe it would have been better if the internet had never been invented " , for him and his kind that`s probably true. Now with blog`s like this one , it`s all coming out. All the phony media created hero`s , all the two faced lying politician`s, the government sanctioned murder`s, everything. Thank God for alternative media. The Genie is out of the bottle. And thank you Mr. V. for having the cahoonas to do what your doing.

Whenever anyone has an interaction with the ATF, or FBI, or . . ., publish the agents' names. They are required to identify themselves and everyone should require them to follow standard law enforcement practice and "remove the ID from the wallet, please", then record the info thereon.

After all, as they keep telling us, "If they're doing nothing wrong" they should have no problem with having their name (and badge number) associated publicly with their activities.

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"Progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress."

I believe that liberty is the only genuinely valuable thing that men have invented, at least in the field of government, in a thousand years. I believe that it is better to be free than to be not free, even when the former is dangerous and the latter safe. I believe that the finest qualities of man can flourish only in free air – that progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress, and of no permanent value. I believe that any man who takes the liberty of another into his keeping is bound to become a tyrant, and that any man who yields up his liberty, in however slight the measure, is bound to become a slave. -- H.L. Mencken

On the efficacy of passive resistance in the face of the collectivist beast. . .

Had the Japanese got as far as India, Gandhi's theories of "passive resistance" would have floated down the Ganges River with his bayoneted, beheaded carcass. -- Mike Vanderboegh.

In the future . . .

When the histories are written, “National Rifle Association” will be cross-referenced with “Judenrat.” -- Mike Vanderboegh to Sebastian at "Snowflakes in Hell"

"Smash the bloody mirror."

If you find yourself through the looking glass, where the verities of the world you knew and loved no longer apply, there is only one thing to do. Knock the Red Queen on her ass, turn around, and smash the bloody mirror. -- Mike Vanderboegh

From Kurt Hoffman over at Armed and Safe.

"I believe that being despised by the despicable is as good as being admired by the admirable."

From long experience myself, I can only say, "You betcha."

"Only cowards dare cringe."

The fears of man are many. He fears the shadow of death and the closed doors of the future. He is afraid for his friends and for his sons and of the specter of tomorrow. All his life's journey he walks in the lonely corridors of his controlled fears, if he is a man. For only fools will strut, and only cowards dare cringe. -- James Warner Bellah, "Spanish Man's Grave" in Reveille, Curtis Publishing, 1947.

"We fight an enemy that never sleeps."

"As our enemies work bit by bit to deconstruct, we must work bit by bit to REconstruct. Be mindful where we should be. Set goals. We fight an enemy that never sleeps. We must learn to sleep less." -- Mike H. at What McAuliffe Said

"The Fate of Unborn Millions. . ."

"The time is now near at hand which must probably determine, whether Americans are to be, Freemen, or Slaves; whether they are to have any property they can call their own; whether their Houses, and Farms, are to be pillaged and destroyed, and they consigned to a State of Wretchedness from which no human efforts will probably deliver them. The fate of unborn Millions will now depend, under God, on the Courage and Conduct of this army-Our cruel and unrelenting Enemy leaves us no choice but a brave resistance, or the most abject submission; that is all we can expect-We have therefore to resolve to conquer or die." -- George Washington to his troops before the Battle of Long Island.

"We will not go gently . . ."

This is no small thing, to restore a republic after it has fallen into corruption. I have studied history for years and I cannot recall it ever happening. It may be that our task is impossible. Yet, if we do not try then how will we know it can't be done? And if we do not try, it most certainly won't be done. The Founders' Republic, and the larger war for western civilization, will be lost.

But I tell you this: We will not go gently into that bloody collectivist good night. Indeed, we will make with our defiance such a sound as ALL history from that day forward will be forced to note, even if they despise us in the writing of it.

And when we are gone, the scattered, free survivors hiding in the ruins of our once-great republic will sing of our deeds in forbidden songs, tending the flickering flame of individual liberty until it bursts forth again, as it must, generations later. We will live forever, like the Spartans at Thermopylae, in sacred memory.

-- Mike Vanderboegh, The Lessons of Mumbai:Death Cults, the "Socialism of Imbeciles" and Refusing to Submit, 1 December 2008

"A common language of resistance . . ."

"Colonial rebellions throughout the modern world have been acts of shared political imagination. Unless unhappy people develop the capacity to trust other unhappy people, protest remains a local affair easily silenced by traditional authority. Usually, however, a moment arrives when large numbers of men and women realize for the first time that they enjoy the support of strangers, ordinary people much like themselves who happen to live in distant places and whom under normal circumstances they would never meet. It is an intoxicating discovery. A common language of resistance suddenly opens to those who are most vulnerable to painful retribution the possibility of creating a new community. As the conviction of solidarity grows, parochial issues and aspirations merge imperceptibly with a compelling national agenda which only a short time before may have been the dream of only a few. For many Americans colonists this moment occurred late in the spring of 1774." -- T.H. Breen, The Marketplace of Revolution: How Consumer Politics Shaped American Independence, Oxford University Press, 2004, p.1.